


By Virtue Fall

by chezvous



Category: The Mentalist, X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - No Powers, M/M, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-08-19
Updated: 2012-03-20
Packaged: 2017-10-22 20:01:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 8
Words: 13,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/241996
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chezvous/pseuds/chezvous
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Former celebrity psychic medium Charles Xavier works as an independent consultant for the Westchester County Bureau of Investigation. Senior Special Agent Erik Lehnsherr, head of the homicide department, wants to know his damage.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Prior knowledge of 'The Mentalist' is not altogether necessary (I hope), though it can definitely be helpful. Everyone should just watch it anyway because it's an excellent show.

_  
**Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall.**   
_

William Shakespeare ; _Measure for Measure, Act II Scene I_

 

\--

 

The first thing that Agent Moira McTaggert notices about Senior Agent Erik Lehnsherr as she steps onto the crime scene is his mouth. It's wide, but not generous, pursed thin and tight, almost stretched across his face as if it’s quite displeased to be there.

It is not a mouth to be touched, though judging by the hard set of his jaw and his somber, professional black suit it’s only complementary to the rest of him. She supposes it’s effective for investigations, but it doesn’t exactly bode well for the nature of his character. That’s alright—she’s not in the business of solving crime for the recognition of her peers.

"Agent McTaggert, I presume." He greets her with a terse nod, but does not offer her his hand or any other form of welcome. True, after her briefing she was not exactly expecting one, but she would be lying if a small part of her didn't hope that the reports may have exaggerated. No such luck, apparently.

"Yes," She clears her throat and recomposes herself, giving him her most beatific smile. Just because he looks to be in person exactly how he looks on paper doesn't mean she needs to dispense of her own manners. "And you must be Special Agent Lehnsherr.” He inclines his head but does not say anything further so she continues efficiently. “They sent me up from Washington to investigate the case. Why don't you bring me up to speed on what's happened here?"

Erik turns toward the crowd of agents and officers crowded around the corpse. "Darwin!"

An agent stands up and approaches them, a clipboard in his hands. Moira recognizes him as Armando Muñoz, commonly known as Darwin, a former coroner who was on loan from the New York crime lab for the Kitridge case last year but who fit so well into the WCBI (hence the nickname, she supposed) that he was granted a transfer after the case closed.

“Agent Moira McTaggert; I’ll be assisting on this case.”

“Good to meet you. You can call me Darwin; everyone does.” Moira does get offered a hand and a warm smile this time and she takes it gratefully. Just because she’s dealt with the Erik Lehnsherrs of the world too often in her own department to be surprised or upset doesn’t mean that she can’t appreciate the simple decency of the gesture.

“So what can you tell me about this case, Darwin?”

Darwin flips the top sheet of his clipboard over and reads her the victim’s profile. "The victim's name is Danielle Strong, female, age twenty-seven—preliminary reports say that cause of death is repeated blows to the head from multiple angles.”

“She was bludgeoned to death.” Moira grimaces—one of her least favorite ways to go, and it’s disturbing that she’s investigated enough homicides during her career to even merit ranking them. “Was there more than one attacker?”

“It’s entirely possible,” says Darwin, flipping through the sheets with an eyebrow raised critically. “There is severe blunt-force trauma to both sides of the head. Would you like to take a look at the body and confirm? We haven’t yet determined the murder weapon.”

“I would—”

“ _Xavier_!” The rest of Moira’s reply is cut off by Lehnsherr’s sharp exclamation. Both she and Darwin whip their heads around to where he is stalking off into the orchard, two agents scrambling up to follow him, as if they did it every day, as everyone else went back to poking around in the dirt. “Xavier—for god’s sake, _come back_!”

Moira hadn’t come across anyone named Xavier in her briefing, but the name sounded vaguely familiar. Before she can rack her brains as to where she had heard it before, Lehnsherr and the two agents reappear, led by a man who looks completely out of place, like he belongs in an Ivy League lecture hall rather than the scene of a homicide.

The man casts around, a bit theatrically, stepping neatly out of the way as Lehnsherr makes to grab for his left arm. He looks altogether too pleased to be here in contrast to Lehnsherr’s grim expression, dressed in a smart, cobalt blue waistcoat and trousers with his white dress shirt rolled up to the elbows, a jacket matching the waistcoat slung over his elbow. Spying Moira and Darwin, his startlingly blue eyes light up and he strides energetically toward them, practically bouncing on the balls of his Oxfords. As he nears, she sees something gleaming in his left fist—that must be what Lehnsherr was trying to take from him.

“Ah, you must be Agent McTaggert—” He says when he reaches them, slightly out of breath, sliding his left hand in his trouser pocket as he extends his right, palm-up. Moira, momentarily disoriented by his light English accent, puts her hand in his and he bends over it, pressing his lips to her knuckles in the way that she’s quite certain no one who isn’t trying to be ironic does anymore. “A pleasure to make your acquaintance,” He murmurs, wavy brown hair falling into his eyes, and she can feel him smiling against her skin. “Truly.”

“I—um—” She blinks and stammers, which gives Lehnsherr enough time to catch up to them, a displeased downward twist to his mouth that makes Moira involuntarily think of broody Victorian heroes. “The—pleasure is all mine—”

“Xavier.” Lehnsherr growls, and Xavier turns, giving him an innocent, full-wattage smile.

“Why, good morning, Erik. Lovely day for a walk, isn’t it? A bit brisk, but fresh air does everyone good.”

Erik closes his eyes with a long exhale and Moira can practically hear himself counting to ten in his head, trying not to do anything that would be deemed anything less than professional. His right index finger twitches, an involuntary flex, like he’s pulling a trigger.

“Xavier,” He says flatly when he opens his eyes again, gritting out each syllable between his teeth. “You cannot just _take_ unbagged evidence off a body, especially not with your bare hands. Don’t act like you don’t know the procedure.”

Xavier makes a thoughtful noise, tapping a finger against his pursed lips. “But would it still be evidence,” He asks, tone suddenly grave, “If no one knew of its existence?”

“I don’t have time for your games today, Xavier.”

“I’m not playing a game, Erik—I’m merely presenting a curious philosophical conundrum, similar to the age-old question of whether a tree falling in a forest makes a sound if no one is around to hear it—”

“ _Charles, please_.”

Xavier stops then, looking surprised, and there’s a moment of tense silence between them before his cheeks dimple and he laughs, the air around them dissipating like clouds after a storm. Moira realizes that she, like Darwin and the other two agents, had been holding their breath, as if waiting for a bomb to drop.

“There we are, then. That’s all I wanted to hear.” Xavier pulls the shiny thing out of his pocket—it’s a hypodermic needle in a small plastic baggie. “You know that I would never compromise your evidence—in fact, I have your murder weapon right here.”

Erik doesn’t snatch it from his outstretched palm, though it seems to be a very near thing, and holds it up to the light, examining it. “The murder weapon?” He asks, eyes narrowing. “But Darwin said that the cause of death was blunt force trauma; the amount of blood is unmistakable.”

“Aye, but there’s the rub,” Xavier leans in conspiratorially, glancing from Lehnsherr to Moira to the other agents, as if they’re all sharing in some great secret, “I think that if you took some samples and had them tested back at the lab, you would find that most of the blood isn’t hers. In fact, I believe that after the initial test, you would be able to determine that the blood is not human at all, but that it came from the species _Sus domesticus_.”

Everyone stares.

“…what?” says one of the other agents finally, a gangly redhead with a half-vacant gaze. Moira remembers him vaguely as Sean Cassidy, formerly of the NYPD before taking a job with the homicide department of the WCBI as their resident ballistics expert. The second, a blond, fitter young man she recognizes as Alex Summers—he’s had quite the colorful past, including a stint in juvenile detention followed by four years in the Special Forces, where he retired with honors—raises an eyebrow. Moira and Darwin look at each other, confused.

Charles smiles at each of them in turn and continues indulgently. “The domesticated pig—terribly clever creatures; it’s unfortunate what’s happened to this one. If you were to look at the skin between the forefinger and middle finger on Miss Strong’s left hand,” He holds out his own, indicating the place where the skin meets, “Beneath all the dirt and dried blood, which the murderer took particular care to rub on her, I might add, you would find a peculiar sort of puncture wound.”

“Filled with…what?” Darwin asks, taking the evidence bag from Lehnsherr and turning it over in his hands. “Was she an addict?”

“Most certainly not an addict—she was in the prime of her life, didn’t drink or smoke or abuse anything. If I were to venture an educated guess I would say simple oxygen, injected into her bloodstream, suffocating her from the inside out. It would take less than two minutes for her to die. The blows to the head occurred after the fact—they’re…ornamental, if you will, meant to throw the pursuers off the trail. He poured pig’s blood all over her to make it look as if she died in this meadow, but look more closely and you’ll see how some of the grass around her is flattened down. She was dragged here from another location entirely.”

“That sounds like a lot of conjecture, Xavier.” Lehnsherr straightens up.

Xavier smiles. “It always does.” They stare at each other for a moment more before Lehnsherr finally looks past him to where Sean, Alex, Darwin, and Moira still stand.

“Well?” He says sharply, “You heard him. Take the samples back to the lab and start on the victim’s family. Find out who has motive for killing Danielle Strong and dumping her here.”

“Yessir—” They scatter, all looking visibly relieved, leaving Moira, Xavier, and Lehnsherr standing in an awkward semi-circle.

Xavier is the first to break the silence, clasping his hands behind his back. “Well, Erik, why don’t you finish up here? I’ll take Agent McTaggert back to Headquarters and help her to settle in.”

Lehnsherr fixes his gaze on Xavier for a beat before nodding. “To be honest, I’d rather keep you in my sights so I can make sure you don’t get us all fired by tampering with evidence, but if you cause a ruckus at HQ, at least you’re someone else’s problem.”

Xavier does not look put out at all—on the contrary, he’s beaming more brightly than ever. “Thank you for your vote of confidence, Erik.” Strangely enough, he doesn’t seem to be sarcastic.

With a jerk of his chin and a pithy parting acknowledgement from Lehnsherr (more than Moira expected at this point, to be quite honest), he too departs, jaw set in what Moira is starting to suspect is his default expression.

“Well!” She turns to see Xavier, looking nonplussed as ever, smiling at the Senior Agent’s departing back with a strange sort of fondness. “Quite a morning, wouldn’t you say?”

“Yes, quite.” Moira inhales, ready to ask something before realizing that it would probably sound needlessly accusatory any way she could put it, but Xavier stops her, pressing the tips of two of his fingers to his temple briefly.

“You want to know how I could possibly have come to the conclusions I did in so short a time.”

“Well—yes.”

“Come with me and I will tell you on the way to headquarters.” Xavier holds his hand out to her again, this time sideways, to give her a warm handshake. “I don’t believe I was ever able to properly introduce myself. My name is Charles Xavier, and I’m a consultant for the Westchester County Bureau of Investigation.”

 

\--

 

It’s only later that night in her new apartment, as Moira unpacks the last of her clothing and organizes her closet, that she remembers where she has heard the name Charles Xavier before. When she realizes, she almost hits her forehead against the wall for not having made the connection sooner.

The Juggernaut case.

Of course.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HAHAHAHA REMEMBER WHEN I HAD TWO WORKS IN PROGRESS I STILL HAVEN'T FINISHED YET?
> 
> \--well, now I have three. Sorry, sorry, I know people don't like reading WIPs but it's hard to concentrate on one idea when another one is just eating away at your brain, you know? Like before, I can't promise when and how often this will be updated, especially since school starts up in less than ten days, but I just had to get this out there now because how _perfect_ of a parallel is this? Charles can seriously pull off Jane's wardrobe. As always, thank you for reading (and I am so sorry in advance for keeping you waiting--I know it sucks big-time)! ♥


	2. Chapter 2

**_( Three years ago )_ **

**_  
_**

“Welcome back. If you’re just now joining us, today’s guest is celebrity psychic Dr. Charles Xavier, who has been helping the WCBI investigate a string of serial murders committed by a man who calls himself the Juggernaut. Thank you for talking with us today, Dr. Xavier.”

“Thank you Gwen, and please, feel free to call me Charles. Dr. Xavier was my father.”

“The influential nuclear physicist, Brian Xavier.”

“That is correct.”

“But you yourself hold multiple doctorates as well—least of all in Psychology, Anthropology, and, most surprisingly, Genetics. It’s also common knowledge that you graduated from Harvard at the age of sixteen. Tell us about why you’ve chosen clairvoyance over, say, becoming a professor or a scientist.”

“Well, Gwen, the sciences were always my first love. I suppose you could say that my desire to help people reconnect with loved ones who have passed really stemmed from my studies into exactly what makes us human, and I’m not talking about opposable thumbs or the history of our civilization, though those are some of the things that make humanity so extraordinary. I’m talking about DNA, the essence of what makes us who we are instead of the single-celled organisms who first washed up on earth’s shores eons ago.”

“Fascinating. And how did you discover your gift, Charles?”

“I’ve actually always felt that I’ve had…a sixth sense, if you will, though my studies always took precedence so I had no time to really examine it when I was young. A few years after I first graduated—pursuing my second degree in Psychology at Columbia University, coincidentally—a colleague of mine learned that her mother, with whom she had been very close, had passed away. And, um, I wasn’t quite sure how it happened, but I felt myself engulfed by this incredible, unearthly warmth and I felt this…beautiful, golden presence, very much like a mother’s embrace—the way we all remember being held by people who have loved us. Without really knowing what I was doing, I asked it if it wanted to speak to my colleague, and she conveyed to my colleague through me that the presence was indeed her mother, that she was no longer in pain, that she forgave her daughter, and that she hoped she and her fiancé would live a long and very happy life together.”

“You’ll forgive me for sounding skeptical, but that sounds like a reply you could get from anyone who called themselves a psychic? What makes  _you_  the real deal, Charles?”

“Well, the interesting thing is, I learned afterward that my colleague had been engaged for two weeks to a man her family did not approve of. They had planned to elope but the bond between she and her mother was so strong that she could not bear to keep such a secret. Her mother was the only one who knew about it and they did not part on the best of terms before she passed. To be able to give my colleague her peace of mind back was a reward beyond any research I had done in my life up to that point.”

“That’s amazing! And then you switched to clairvoyance?”

“Oh no, that took many more years. I  _was_  a scientist, so of course I was prone to my own skepticism, and I had a degree to finish besides. Over the years, I had to my own theories and dispel my own misconceptions countless times before I was finally able to come to terms with the fact that the dead truly do live on and that I could speak to them.”

“And the living? It’s said that you can read minds as well.”

“To a point, though I won’t say it’s not more difficult. The dead are…refreshingly concise, I suppose you could say. I have learned that certain things just become unimportant after death.”

“Can you read my mind right now?”

“Well now, telepathy isn’t quite my specialty, but I can give it a shot. Sit towards me, put your hands in mine, palms up, and calm your mind, focusing on a singular thought. Narrow your universe down to that one thought and just hold it there, like a single sentence printed on a blank piece of paper. …yes, I am starting to see it now, it’s becoming clearer—you are thinking that I have the bluest eyes you have ever seen; that’s very flattering, thank you.”

“I—oh my god, that’s—wow. That’s incredible! Everyone, give a big round of applause to Charles Xavier.”

“You’re too kind.”

“Now, back to our original topic. Tell us about your involvement with the Juggernaut case. How does a psychic find a place as a criminal profiler in a government agency?”

“It’s not much of an involvement, if I must be honest. I told the Westchester County Bureau of Investigation that if they would let me assist, I would use my gift to help them discover the identity of the Juggernaut. Unfortunately, but also unsurprisingly, they refused my offer.”

“Do you have any idea as to who the Juggernaut may be? Official reports tell us very little and no one has ever seen him and survived.”

“I don’t know for sure, but I have felt his presence—I can feel it, even from here, Gwen—and I can tell you that there is no good in his heart.”

“You say that in with a lot of certainty.”

“Well, he is a vile creature—that much is for certain.”

“And do you think he’ll kill again before he is caught?”

“Undoubtedly. I have known those like him and they never stop. It’s a terrible addiction, one that will cost him both his life and the lives of all those he will take until he is apprehended.”

“You say you’ve known people like him before. What do you mean by that?”

“I’ve spoken to many who have passed on, Gwen. For some, their thirst for sadism and mind games cannot be slaked and it is only death that can stop their cycle of violence. I would not hasten to call them people.”

“If the Juggernaut is watching this program, do you have anything you would like to say to him?”

“Only that he is a sad, lonely, depraved little coward who kills because it’s the only semblance of power he has in his pathetic excuse for a life. I have every confidence that justice will prevail—I can only hope that it will be sooner rather than too late.”

“Wow, what a powerful message. Thank you very much for your time, Charles. All the best to you, and we hope that you’ll keep up your good work.”

“Thank you, Gwen. It was a pleasure to be here and, ah, if you’d still like to get that drink you were thinking about earlier, I’ll pick you up outside the studio lot after the show.”

  
\--

  
All the house lights are on when Charles pulls into the driveway, a little half-past eleven. That’s curious. It’s a Friday night, which means that Raven should be at a friend’s house. Maybe she wanted to stay in and if that were the case, she really should have called him; what if Charles had decided to bring Gwen home? 

Then again, who was he trying to fool? He knew he had to drive himself back at the end of the night—he wasn’t going to drink  _that_  much.

Shrugging, he lets himself in and throws his coat over the back of his favorite armchair, heading into the kitchen for a glass of water to help clear his head.

“Raven?” He calls, but there’s no answer. Perhaps she had already gone to bed, which, given that first of all, it’s a Friday night and second of all, it’s Raven, is still unlikely. His sister is not forgetful—she always turns the lights out before leaving and a quick peek into the garage confirms that her car is still parked inside. If she took sick, she would have almost certainly called him, if only to guilt him into bringing her back pint upon pint of chocolate ice cream to ease the suffering.

Curiouser and curiouser.

Dumping the rest of his water in the sink, Charles sets it on the counter and pulls out his cellphone, pressing “1” on his speed-dial and holding it to his ear.

Some Top 40s radio hit that he recognizes as Raven’s latest ringtone blares tinnily and he startles, glancing around for the source of the noise before pinpointing it as coming from upstairs. Frowning, he climbs the stairs two at a time and slowly opens the door to her bedroom. It’s empty. The sound isn’t coming from here.

Feeling a ripple of unease now, Charles shuts the door and cranes his head down the hall. All looks normal, until his eye catches on a small square of white pinned to the bathroom door at the very end.

The ringtone has stopped and suddenly he has become all too aware of the silence, ringing in his ears and seeming to echo down the hallway as he takes one step, and then another, eyes transfixed upon the paper. He doesn’t know where this sudden sense of foreboding is coming from and his hand shakes as he detaches the paper from the door and unfolds it.

 

>  _Dear Doctor Xavier (or do you prefer Charles?),_
> 
>  _I do not like to be slandered in the media, especially by an arrogant, money-grubbing fraud. If you were a real psychic instead of a dishonest little worm, you wouldn't need to open the door to see what I've done to your lovely sister._
> 
>  _– Juggernaut_

 

It is written in red ink. Charles runs one finger over the words and a tiny bit flakes off.

Not ink, then, he realizes. Blood.

All of a sudden, he can’t breathe.

His lips form the words  _oh god_  or something like it as the paper flutters to the ground and every instinct in his body is telling him to flee, to leave, to get away, to wake up because this is a bad  _dream it has to be there is no way this is happening_ —

But all he can do is turn the knob slowly.

Oh, so slowly.

The light is turned off, but there is a small window about eye-level next to the mirror. A solitary beam of moonlight shines against the porcelain tiles, highlighting a grotesquely smiling face, stark red against white, smears of red drip, drip, dripping down.

Charles is afraid to turn on the light.

He sucks in a breath that feels like inhaling sandpaper and doesn’t let it out again.

His hand inches towards the light switch.


	3. Chapter 3

“Yo, Bigfoot, I got some blood samples for you to test—woah, Professor X, wasn’t expecting you here.” Alex almost drops the bag of test tubes he was holding to see a wavy-haired lump stir into consciousness on Hank McCoy’s ratty old couch.

Charles peeks sleepily over the edge of his jacket, swinging his legs off the side of the couch where he had previously been sprawled, blinking furiously against the light pouring in from the hallway. “Oh, Alex. Hullo, is it morning already?”

“Yeah, it’s like, eight in the morning. Did you _sleep_ here?”

“Oh yes, Dr. McCoy’s couch is actually quite comfortable.” He rolls his shoulders back, cracking his neck, before straightening his hair and collar, turning himself back to rights.

“The boss is going to be pissed if he finds out you didn’t go home again.”

Charles favors him with a slight quirk of the left corner of his mouth that grows into a smile with a flash of teeth, the kind meant to put people at ease. “Ah, well, then perhaps we ought to make sure he doesn’t find out—Erik is stressed out enough about the Strong case as it is and I’d hate to cause him any more distress.”

“You got that right.” Alex resists the urge to roll his eyes. Erik has been in a bad mood all morning; the questioning portion of yesterday hadn’t gone as smoothly as it could have and ended with the boss and Sean chasing down the victim’s brother-in-law, who thought they were after him for his connections to a local drug ring (what part of “I’m Special Agent Lehnsherr, this is Agent Cassidy, and we would like to ask you a few questions regarding the murder of Danielle Strong” was not immediately understood as “sit the fuck down and don’t do anything stupid”?). The chase had gone on for four city blocks before Erik leapt and caught the brother-in-law with a running tackle, pushing them both out of the intersection just as a truck whooshed by and saving them both from becoming urban roadkill.

Sean thought it was one of the most badass things he has ever seen Erik do. Erik looked like he was about to burst a blood vessel.

They deposited the brother-in-law into a jail cell to cool down for the night and Alex is supposed to interrogate him properly this morning. Judging from the way the brother-in-law twitched every time either he or Erik mentioned Danielle’s name the day before, they might be able to get some interesting information out of him.

“You’d best get upstairs so Erik can brief you before the interrogation. You can leave the samples on Dr. McCoy’s desk; I will personally make sure he gets them.” Charles’ voice brings him back to the present.

“—right, thanks.” Alex crosses over to the desk quickly and puts the baggie on the largest empty section of desk he can find. He has never remembered a time where McCoy’s desk was clean. There are files everywhere, parts of unfinished reports and clippings from various scientific magazines, rolls of readouts from all of the tests run through his lab daily. It was suggested by almost everyone on the team at some point that he should really look into getting an assistant, but Henry Phillip McCoy has his own way of doing things and makes a point of hand-delivering his results, which are never tardy and always exhaustingly thorough, so they’ve let him be.

“And Alex?” Alex turns at the door to see Charles looking at him with his head tilted, fingers steepled beneath his chin thoughtfully.

“Yeah, Professor?”

Charles chuckles softly, inclining his head. “You know I prefer Charles, but I don’t mind if you want to call me that. However…” His tone turns quiet and considerate. “Perhaps we might begin to call Dr. McCoy by his name, and not ‘Bigfoot’? I can’t help but feel that it’s counterproductive. I know that you and he are not always on the best of terms, but Hank is as much a member of the team as I am and we ought to make him feel a part of it, don’t you think?”

Alex is taken aback by the sudden reprimand, gentle as it is. To be honest, he didn’t even realize Charles took notice of the nicknames (though in retrospect, that was a stupid lack of assumption as Charles notices _everything_ )—they just sort of developed when they first became a unit. Sean was christened Banshee after he fell out of a second-story window during a chase with a surprisingly ear-splitting shriek, completely unhurt but for his slightly bruised ego (having partly fallen on the suspect, who was just a little too slow to get to his feet). Darwin is Darwin because of how quickly he fit into becoming a field agent after coming in from a crime lab, and Alex himself became Havoc after he may or may not have accidentally incinerated an entire warehouse full of cocaine after a bust operation. Not his proudest moment, but considering that they were able to round up almost the entire cartel in the process, all he got was a slap on the wrist from the superiors and a pat on the back from Erik.

And Hank, well—Hank _does_ have big feet and he tends to slouch around the office. He’s never mentioned that it bothers him. Erik is the only one on the team who doesn’t have a nickname beyond the obligatory ‘boss;’ Alex would like to keep his balls securely attached to his body, thank you very much.

Charles, despite what he appears on the surface, actually keeps most of his opinions regarding the team to himself. Of course, there are times where he laughs and teases, perches on Darwin’s desk whenever he shows them a new mind trick, and makes the occasional joke at the boss’s expense when he finds him to be in a particularly prickly mood, but other than that, he’s usually seated somewhere off to the side with a cup of tea in his hand and his nose in the day’s newspaper, oblivious to everything else that goes on around him until the boss, exasperated, growls “ _Xavier_ ,” and jerks the paper out of his hands.

If it were anyone else but the Professor, Alex is sure they would be out on their asses by the second day. In fact, Charles seems to get away with a lot under Erik’s nose and though he grumbles and swears and warns and makes serial-killer faces as he jabs his index finger threateningly, the boss never seems overly-inclined to actually make good on his threats. Alex wonders what Charles has on Erik to make him look the other way so often, and if he can possibly get in on it.

“…yeah, okay. I’ll remember that, sorry.”

“Oh, no need to apologize.” Charles smiles, shaking his head and settling back into the couch, stretching with a lazy yawn. “I just thought it prudent to let you know. I will see you later this afternoon? I should like to go to Miss Strong’s home to see if I can’t figure out what she may have been doing to have gotten her killed in such a fashion.”

“Of course.” Alex nods, trying not to look too abashed. Charles’ nickname is pretty accurate; despite the fact that he’s always nice about it, sometimes he makes Alex feel like he’s back in the principal’s office. “And—thanks.”

“Anytime!”

He closes the door behind him quietly and is halfway up the stairs before he realizes that he never asked Charles why he was sleeping in McCoy’s office to begin with. He almost makes the decision to go back and ask when he is suddenly jolted with the memory of Charles on the night of the incident with the Juggernaut. Alex had only been able to catch a small glimpse, but what he saw stayed with him.

Charles Xavier, clutching desperately at the shock blanket he was huddled beneath, staring blankly up at Erik as he asked him questions in hushed tones, unable to do more than give tiny jerks of his head, “yes” or “no.” Once in a while his throat would convulse as he swallowed, the light of the ambulance dying his skin red as paramedics and police streamed around them. He was completely separate from the confident, grinning man they had all met when he strolled into the WCBI last month and offered his consultation services as if it were already a given. 

Erik had turned him away _personally_ , and everyone thought that had been the end of it.

At the time of the incident, Alex wondered if he had already spoken to his dead sister, the one whose blood painted the walls of the upstairs bathroom, but that had been before he had learned the almost more-impossible truth. 

It’s been three years and Charles’ smile may be back in full swing, but now that he thinks about it, the bags underneath his eyes haven’t really gotten any less bruised. 

Alex sighs and runs a hand through his hair, taking the rest of the stairs two at a time and mentally preparing himself for the meeting with Danielle’s brother-in-law. Finding her murderer as soon as possible is more important than remembering nights he wishes he could forget. Let the man sleep some more—god knows he must need it.


	4. Chapter 4

Danielle Strong had been a very pretty young woman.

Charles runs his fingers over the glossy five-by-seven color photograph attached to the rest of her profile, silently committing all the parts of her he could glean from the snapshot to his memory. Her hair, strawberry waves that fall to the middle of her back, whips behind her as she laughed towards the camera, caught in the circle of her husband’s arms. She had a dotting of freckles on her nose and even in this frozen moment of time, her glass-green eyes seem to sparkle. Her husband’s eyes are closed, too busy burrowing his nose into her hair, his expression one of complete and utter bliss.

The photograph was taken, according to the timestamp in the corner, merely a week after their wedding, which also meant that it was taken exactly a week before she disappeared.

They were happy, of that Charles is positive. There is nothing in this photograph to suggest that her new marriage was the cause of her death, or that, indeed, her husband had anything to do with it at all. Their body language is open and honest. They loved each other, leaned into one another as they twirled on the lawn in front of the tidy bungalow they were to call home.

Danielle Strong had grown up in Chesterton, Missouri, a small-town girl with dreams of traveling the world. She was accepted to NYU and received her degree in Journalism, receiving an offer to write for the _Boston Globe_. She met her future husband at a press conference for his father’s company, he invited her out for drinks afterwards, and the rest was history.

The husband’s secretary, whom Erik had disliked instantly (judging by the way his back stiffened and the corner of his mouth twitched ever-so-slightly) for the way she simpered at him when they first arrived at his office, stood in shock as Charles rattled off these facts at her while they were in the waiting room. Apparently, there are still people in the world who believe that he has psychic powers even though it was painfully clear that he was just reciting word-for-word off the biography he found on her website. Well, their gullibility is his benefit.

Somehow, he doesn’t think that Danielle’s widower will stay in New York for much longer; no, most likely he’ll go back to Boston and take back the corporate position in his father’s company that he had left. He had married her because she promised adventure, something that his own silver-spoon upbringing lacked. Now that her promise had brought unbelievable joy and grief in the span of just one month, he would seek the safety of the past. The man that Danielle left behind was a good man, if not a brave one.

Charles takes careful stock of the jewelry she is wearing in the photo: beads of turquoise woven into an elaborate but elegant necklace, silver bangles on her left wrist, a small wooden eagle totem dangling from the ear that is not obscured by her hair, and her extravagant wedding ring. The first three represent places she had been sent on assignment—Egypt, India, Alaska—and if Charles were to look in her jewelry box (as he plans to do later today), he is certain to find other small mementos. The wedding ring looks out of place; her husband grew up with two older sisters who spoke often of judging a man by the size of the stone he could afford. Danielle did not have the heart to tell him that a simpler ring would have sufficed.

He takes her smile and her laughing eyes, and in his mind, superimposes it over that of the dead, unseeing face he first examined when Erik called him in. She deserves to be remembered as the vibrant and beautiful woman she was in life—he can give her that much, at least until he finds her murderer.

This is not because her smile reminds him of Raven. In fact, he very carefully does not think about his sister as he tucks the photograph into its manila folder and sets it back on Erik’s desk. “Well, that was indeed informative.”

Erik stands up from where he had been sitting behind his desk, watching Charles examine the photograph. “Is the ring a motive for murder?”

Charles shakes his head. “Unfortunately not. That may have been what the killer wanted us to think, but she was not moving when the oxygen was injected into her bloodstream, and the method is too sophisticated for a mere robbery gone wrong. No, I think the answer may very well lie in her jewelry box.”

“Her jewelry box? Take Summers with you, then. He was with me when we spoke to the husband yesterday so he will remember.”

“If I may ask, what will you be doing?”

“Agents McTaggert and Cassidy will be accompanying me to check on a lead. The brother-in-law mentioned a few points of interest involving hostility in the victim’s workplace. It’s possible that this may be a case of muckraking gone wrong.”

This is precisely what Charles wanted to hear and he must wear his excitement quite plainly on his face for Erik raises his eyebrows, watching him bounce on the balls of his heels with something akin to amusement. “Something about that interest you, Xavier?”

“Immensely.” Charles claps his hands together. “When you’re questioning her co-workers, please do me a favour and ask about whether or not anyone remembers what Danielle was wearing last Thursday, paying particular attention as to if they can recall the color of her shoes.”

The amusement slides off Erik’s face. “Knowing better than to ask for clarification, I’m going to assume this is crucially related to the case and that if I ask, the murderer will immediately get nervous and slip up, closing my case.”

“Perhaps. Call it a personal line of inquiry if you’d like.”

Erik rolls his eyes towards the ceiling, but eventually consents with a long-suffering sigh and slides Charles the keys to the Escalade, telling him to get a move-on. Charles knows Erik hates it when he’s being evasive, but that’s half of what makes it such fun.

“Alex?” He calls once he shuts the office door behind him, and the agent in question looks up from where he’s pretending to read paperwork at his desk while really engaging in a secret paper-throwing war with Sean. “I assume you would like to drive?”

“Hell yeah, thanks, Prof!” Charles tosses Alex the keys. Alex catches them with one hand and scoots out of his rolling chair in one smooth motion, looking considerably brighter. “I need to burn some rubber to make up for the torture of having to deal with the interrogation room all morning. Seriously, it took me half an hour to get him to even open his mouth and when he did, he sounded like Banshee after one of his really bad hangovers—”

“Hey, c’mon man, that was _one time_ —”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel the need to apologize for the slapdash nature of this plot--I'm constantly reworking and editing it; after I get to 10k words, a more polished part one will be posted to live journal, at which time the chapters currently up will also be updated. Anyway, it's not a great process but it's what keeps me constant so I hope you'll forgive me. Thank you so much for reading, and for keeping up with updates if you are. Everything should be picking up soon!


	5. Chapter 5

**_( Three years ago )_ **

 

“I’m not a psychic.”

That’s the first thing Charles Xavier says, voice wavering dangerously when Erik sits him down on the sofa of the hotel room they’ve booked for him. It’s a bit extravagant with its antique wallpaper and French doors leading out to a spacious balcony (Erik takes care to keep Charles away from the balcony’s line of sight in case the Juggernaut decides to return for a second round), but then again, this is Westchester County—it’s hard enough to find a hotel that isn’t adjacent to either a seaside resort or a country club. Usually they will put witnesses up with nearby family members or friends, but Charles stated matter-of-factly that he now has neither, so this will have to do.

Erik, pre-occupied with checking all the windows to make they are secure, doesn’t let it register until he straps his handgun back into his hip holster as Charles repeats himself, more forcefully, “ _I’m not a psychic_.”

“What?” He looks down to see Charles resting his head practically between his legs, held up only by his palms pressing against either side of his temple. At first he doesn’t really understand what Charles is saying—he’s never been much of a believer in anything, God or ghosts or otherwise, so this shouldn’t be surprising to him in the least. He finds himself taken aback, enough so to merit sitting on the edge of the coffee table to better try and understand what exactly Charles seems to be admitting to.

He’s seen Charles in interviews and demonstrations before and was sure that the audience member was a plant. The only thing that Charles really has going for him is his manner and his accent, and Erik hadn’t even been sure that _that_ wasn’t part of the act as well, another way to get gullible socialites to hand over a portion of their inherited fortune for the chance to absolve themselves of petty sins.

They know nothing of sin, not when they’ve been drenched in it from birth.

And when Charles himself all but strutted into the WCBI headquarters and declared that he could help them hunt down the man that eight months and every single one of their best agents couldn’t find, Erik hadn’t been in the mood to be kind. Usually he just humors people he finds arrogant before shutting them down abruptly; he finds it brings his point across more effectively. Alex and Sean, back then the only other members of his field team, had discreetly settled themselves into the small kitchen adjacent to the lobby to watch the fireworks go down as curious agents milled about, waiting for the fireworks.

To their disappointment, there hadn’t been any. “We aren’t in need of your services at this time, Dr. Xavier.” Erik, in his customary black turtleneck and crossed arms, stood at least half a head taller than Charles, whose blithe smile faltered for an instant. “Or ever. When you are able to give me the real name of the Juggernaut and his location with solid, tangible evidence to back it up, then I will welcome you onto the team with open arms and give you a medal for your trouble. Until then, I advise you to stay in your own sandbox.”

Charles had barely closed the door behind him, tail between his legs, when the entire department erupted into loud bursts of laughter.

“Aw, man—” Sean smacked the table with the heel of his hand, rocking back on his chair. “Shot _down_! Did you see his face—”

“Like someone shit in his coffee,” Alex snorted, “—or, his tea I guess, since he’s English and everything.”

 “Nice going, boss!” Sean held his hand out for a high-five that Erik ignored as he passed him to open the refrigerator, rummaging around for a bottle of water. He pulled it out, flicking the condensation on his hand at Sean. Coming from someone else, it might have been playfulness.

“Alright, enough sightseeing. He’s not coming around here again; back to work, everyone.”

“Aww, c’mon, boss! Don’t leave me hanging!”

Honestly, Erik thought that had been the end of it. An entire month went by without any new developments on the case, the Juggernaut lay low, and Charles Xavier was pushed from his mind by new cases that actually merited his attention until that damned primetime interview with Gwen Worthington, which he caught the second half of on a rebroadcast in the kitchen on his lunch break, shutting it off with an irritated snarl as Charles made eyes at the host, undoubtedly thinking himself smooth for saying out loud what had been apparent on her face from the moment he opened his mouth. _Delusional, smug bastard._

A short twelve hours later, he is driving the black Escalade away from the house where the Juggernaut had claimed his thirteenth victim, twenty-one-year-old Raven Xavier, leaving behind a dismembered body in a bathtub full of blood.

Charles Xavier may be a lot of things that Erik dislikes in a person, but none of those qualities, even combined, merited the brutal murder of his sister.

“I’m not—” Charles begins repeating himself a third time, but cuts himself off with a sharp exhale, sitting up straight and rubbing at his eyes. “Agent Lehnsherr,” He begins again, wearily, “I owe you an apology.”

This is the second time he has surprised Erik with his words tonight. “For what?”

“For making a fool of myself at your workplace. You were correct—I was ill-equipped to deal with the Juggernaut and I should have known better than to bait him as I did. I…grossly overestimated my own abilities and my sister paid the price.”

There is not much Erik can say in response to that, so they sit in silence instead, staring past each other at opposite sides of the wall. Once in a while, he’ll glance at Charles, just to make sure he’s not going to go into cardiac arrest when the shock finally settles in, but no, he just sits there, unmoving.

Eventually, minutes or hours later, there’s really no telling, Erik’s cellphone buzzes and a text message from Alex confirms that they’ve secured the perimeter of the hotel. Erik taps back a quick thank you and an order for him and the rest of the unit to go home and get as much sleep as they can before tomorrow. “You’ll be staying here until we can figure out what to do next,” He announces to Charles, who jerks as if startled.

“I—oh, yes, thank you very much.” Charles swallows, looking around with his eyes still very wide. His voice is fainter than it was, tired, though Erik knows all too well that it will be a long time before he allows himself to succumb to the exhaustion. “You wouldn’t...you wouldn’t know where I could get a cup of tea, would you? It would help to keep me present, I can’t—“

Thankful for the opportunity to do something other than attempt interaction with a man who has been traumatized in perhaps the worst way, Erik stands up and motions for Charles to stay where he is, striding towards the kitchenette. “I’ll go take a look.”

Charles smiles, thin and watery, though Erik suspects it’s more out of courtesy than anything else. “Thank you.”

Luckily, there’s a teabag in the basket of complimentary instant coffee and Erik makes two cups of boiling water with the coffee maker, dunking the teabag in one flimsy styrofoam cup and dumping the packet of coffee into the other. He hands the cup of tea to Charles and sits down in the armchair next to the sofa, blowing the steam away. Charles does the same before raising his cup in a mockery of a formal toast and Erik touches the rim of his cup to Charles’, smirking humorlessly before they both sip.

“—that’s—awful.” Erik peers at the brown sludge inside his cup, smacking his lips to try and get the taste off of his tongue, then forces down a larger mouthful. Caffeine is caffeine, as years of stakeouts have taught him.

“Foul,” agrees Charles, wearing the same grimace. “It tastes like someone—”

“Took a shit in it?”

“—Excuse me?”

Erik almost spits out his mouthful of sludge, not having meant Charles to hear that. Usually he has greater restraint, but it’s at least two in the morning and, oh, the man in front of him just walked in on his sister’s dead body less than two hours ago. Tact is one of his lesser problems right now. “Nothing, just—” _–something Summers said once, when it was all just a big joke._

He looks up in alarm when Charles makes a choking noise, worried that he might have just tried to swallow the teabag in a fit, but then he realizes that Charles is _laughing_ , fingers half-covering his mouth and shoulders heaving from the force of it. Erik isn’t actually sure if it can be qualified as a laugh—it’s more half-hiccup, half-sob. Charles flicks his eyes up, meeting Erik’s, and Erik finds the ridiculous urge to laugh bubbling up in him as well, though he’s able to confine it to a slightly delirious upward tilt of his lips.

Finally, Charles seems to relax a bit, his shoulders sagging back against the couch as the last of his moment of hysteria leaves him. “I’m really not, you know,” He murmurs, lacing his fingers around his cup, eyes slipping shut. “I don’t have any powers.” The words are frank and quiet, but still it seems like some kind of grand confession.

“I never thought you did.”

“In that case, will you accept my apology?”

Erik considers. This could be the one chance he has to get a lead that could help him with the Juggernaut investigation. Up until Raven Xavier, the killings have been random—there has been no connection between the Juggernaut and any of the victims, their friends and family, or each other. Even if everything Charles said on-air had been folly, he must have hit upon something that made the Juggernaut tick enough to strike again.

“I will, under one condition.”

Charles cracks one eye open, a careful sliver of blue. “Anything.”

“What’s the real story, Dr. Xavier? If it’s not all some sort of elaborate trick, how did you get so many people to believe that you had supernatural powers?”

“Would you prefer a condensed version, or shall I tell you the entire sordid tale?”

“Seeing as neither of us will be going to sleep tonight, you had better give me the long story. Start from the beginning, and don’t exaggerate or make anything sound like more than it is. I’m only interested in the facts.”

Charles sighs, tilting his head back and kneading at the bridge of his nose. “As you wish. I only ask that you wait until the end to ask me any questions. There are some very important things that I have not told anyone else, and I fear that if I am interrupted, I will lose my nerve. I beg you bear with me.”

Erik leans back, folding his arms across his chest and settling himself into a more comfortable position. He considers taking notes for a moment, but Charles mentioned secrets and Erik is no hypocrite when it comes to secrets. Everything important he will retain to memory naturally. “This is all off the record, then.” He agrees, and Charles nods with a wan smile.

“Thank you.”

And the thing is, Erik still isn’t sure that Charles has anything to thank him for.


	6. Chapter 6

“As you already know, Agent Lehnsherr, I was born and raised in Westchester County. The Xavier Estate still stands, though my sister and I lost the rights both to it and our inheritance when our mother died. She became ill almost immediately after my father was killed in that accident and my stepfather convinced her to change the will while I was studying at Harvard. There has never been any love lost between his family and mine, so it really should not have come as such a shock. As soon as I heard, I applied to be an emancipated minor and took Raven away from Westchester to live with me. I was sixteen at the time, and Raven even younger.

“You will not find any accounts of the next few years in my online biography, I assure you. Especially after I became…established, if you will, I worked very hard to keep that part of my life a secret. There is nothing romantic or marketable about a precocious child struggling to provide for both himself and his sister, even if he _was_ considered a prodigy. It’s a word that means nothing to me now.

“Fortunately, due to the research on biogenetics I was pursuing at the time, as well as honoring my father’s legacy, the Board of Directors sympathized with our plight and offered me a modest living stipend while I completed my degree. Of course, having grown up in the proverbial lap of luxury, suddenly having to worry about things such as the electricity bill and leaving enough in the monthly budget for repairing water damage was quite a shock that I am embarrassed to say I never became quite accustomed to. Though she was several years younger, Raven adjusted to it rather more quickly than I did. ‘ _You’ll be book smarts and I’ll be street smarts_ ,’ is what she used to say, ‘ _Together we almost make a normal person_.’

“She always took our situation in good humor—even having less in Cambridge was better than living in Westchester to her—but I felt responsible for my sister. What kind of older brother could I call myself if we couldn’t even afford for her to go to the movies with her friends or get ice cream? I was rushing to finish my thesis on the theory of a gene, that if activated, could allow humans to control the growth of their own bodies and she was not of age to get a job—not that I allowed her to, anyway, not while she was still in school—so between the stress of my studies and trying to give my sister a normal life, well, I’m sure you can imagine some of the difficulties we faced.

“A keen sense of observation can often be mistaken, for such, shall we say, _powers_ as telepathy. At first it was just on a lark—I was nineteen when I met an acquaintance down at a pub in Cambridge and he bet me a couple of dollars that I could not pinpoint exactly what was different about him that night. Long story short, I could tell just by looking at him that he had lost his virginity to a blonde art student who specialized in oil painting but had been working with charcoal that night. It didn’t take any spectacular leaps in logic, seeing as a strand of blonde hair was stuck to his collar, there were some remnants of charcoal fingerprints on the waistband of his khakis, and he still smelled slightly of turpentine.

“The illusion was, however, powerful enough that it became sort of a weekly occurrence after. People would bet money to find out what I knew about them. I never lied if I could help it, you understand, I only looked at people and read them based on their clothing or their body language; it’s not difficult once you’ve practiced, and I did do a bit of research to find common tells. It didn’t take very long for someone to throw out the word ‘psychic’ and I just never refuted it. Why would I, when it was giving us a better life?

“The story about my colleague and her mother is mostly true, though I didn’t do it for money. Sometimes I truly wish I had, because my actual reasons were less than pure. It had been a particularly difficult February for us—the heat in our apartment had broken down again after we had it fixed in January, and we didn’t have enough to fix it a second time. I tried to put Raven up with a classmate of mine, but she refused to leave my side. As heartening as her company was, the cold irritated us both and so my countenance that month was bitterer than usual.

“At the time, my colleague and I were working on isolating the gene I had described in my thesis, but I could tell that her heart was not in it and that her mind was elsewhere completely. It took me only a day or so to deduce exactly what the issue was; she was trying so hard to hide it that her tells became that much more obvious. If we made any breakthroughs in my research within the month, the University would increase my stipend, but my colleague’s absentmindedness kept us from making any real progress in the allotted time. Eventually, I became so frustrated that I pretended to have felt the spirit of her mother just to put her mind at ease and back on the task at hand.

“In retrospect it may have been mean-spirited, but she was so grateful that clairvoyance was very quickly added to my list of ‘abilities.’ Speaking to the dead is not something you say can only be done once, and the need to ensure that Raven was not living mouth to hand drove me to continue. Before I quite knew it, people from all over the city, all over the _state_ were offering to pay me to communicate with their dead loved ones, more money than the University was willing to give me in a year.

“My mother, absent as she was after my father’s death, always told me that someday I would make my own way in the world, and so I had, though not in any way either of us could have expected. Raven was the only one who ever knew the truth, and she kept it for my sake. It’s a precarious occupation, giving people false hope for a living, and if I were caught, I would not only be denounced as a fraud, but arrested and charged. I couldn’t risk that for Raven or for myself.

“I left the University after I finished my second degree at twenty-two, having quite forgotten my original plans of becoming a scientist. Well—perhaps ‘forgotten’ isn’t quite the term, but I placed it in the back of my mind and did what any sensible graduate would do: follow the money. Clairvoyance is a lucrative venture and somehow I had struck a gold vein in the upper echelons of New England society. It was not difficult to be drawn back into the lifestyle to which I had been accustomed to in my childhood, so after a few months of touring the coast, we returned to Westchester and purchased our own house, leaving the estate for good. As far as we were concerned, our mother was the last of the Xavier dynasty anyhow.

“That’s the whole of it, Agent Lehnsherr, unless you would like to hear about the myriads of socialites I so callously swindled over the next few years and up until this very night, though I have the feeling you’ve already established your opinions on that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> School has resumed and I am officially overbooked about twenty hours every week so updates will be spotty from here up until about Christmas. Thank you so much to everyone who even remotely looks forward to updates for being patient with me--I always welcome your comments, so please let me know what you think. I love you all so very much. ♥


	7. Chapter 7

Charles manages to keep his voice crisp throughout the entire explanation but as soon as he hits the last syllable, he feels all the air rush out of him like he’s been wrung out. He thought that he would feel relief now that someone, _someone_ knows the truth, but all he feels is a resounding emptiness inside his chest cavity, more painful than either grief or guilt.

Erik Lehnsherr is looking at him with an expression he finds himself utterly incapable of reading, whether because of his own vulnerability or in spite of it. His eyes are slightly lidded, but Charles can still see that he is alert and critical, the tautness at the corner of his mouth unchanging.

“So in effect, you _are_ a fraud.”

It isn’t meant to be cruel, but the observation still stings.

Charles sucks in a breath, shutting his eyes, remembering the words on the letter. _Arrogant, money-grubbing fraud_. “I…suppose I deserved that.”

Lehnsherr’s mouth twists, but he makes no more comment on it. Charles looks down at his cup to avoid eye contact, but the tea has gone lukewarm and he no longer has the stomach for it.

“So what will you do now?”

He asks it as if the answer should be simple.

Charles is in no place to even begin trying to think about the future, about going to sleep when he can no longer force his eyes open, of waking up and remembering that he remains alive in a world where Raven no longer walks and laughs and stays up late to keep him company sometimes, just because. “What would you do?” He asks instead, unable to trust himself to answer with anything else.

Lehnsherr snorts bitterly. “Nothing so soft-hearted as what you could come up with, Xavier.”

“I am _not_ soft-hearted.”

“You would seek revenge, then? Hunt him down and kill him, repay blood with blood?”

The thought of blood is sickening. Once more the image comes unbidden, severed limbs piled high in the bathtub, as white as the porcelain that holds it. Stripes of red dripping down the sides, the gore so fresh it hasn’t even had the time to oxidize. Charles was a scientist first, so it makes sense to him factually, but the only thing he could think at the time was _how can one body possibly contain so much blood_?

Charles passes his fingers over his mouth, quelling the violence that threatens to turn his stomach. “I don’t—I don’t know—”

“Of course you don’t.” He can hear the dismissiveness in his tone, the satisfaction that all of his initial conjectures about Charles have been proven right. “But my original question still stands, Mr. Xavier. My team is working right now to find your sister’s murderer and I will join them after this interview, but what will you do? We can provide you protection for a few days, but—”

“The Juggernaut has killed twelve people without being found out in the past year, Mr. Lehnsherr. Thanks to me, he has now taken a thirteenth.” The smile he offers is wan. “If the Juggernaut wanted me dead, it would be completely within his capacity to do so. I can’t go back to—as you so eloquently put it—committing fraud for a living, no serious academic institution will take me into their ranks knowing who I am and what I’ve done, and without Raven I have no home to return to. It doesn’t seem there are many options available to me.”

Lehnsherr says nothing, narrowing his eyes until they’re slits of grey-blue, brow twitching as he thinks. Charles watches his face and follows his train of thought as best he can: the crinkle of his eyes, the set of his jaw as he tenses one side, then another. A solution is forming in his mind, one that cemented itself instantly, but is such a massive risk that he has to chew it over slowly, decide whether or not it’s even worth mentioning. His brows ride lower and lower until they almost cover his eyes, casting, it seems, almost his entire face into shadow.

The minutes tick by and they sit in silence. Finally he sighs, settling his full focus on Charles once again. He’s not happy with what he’s about to say, but the necessity must override his personal persuasions.

“Work with us, then.”

“I—excuse me?” Whatever Charles was expecting to hear, it wasn’t that.

“No one is beyond redemption, Xavier. Help us find your sister’s killer.”

“—Agent Lehnsherr— _Erik_ —I’m not looking for redemption. Nothing that I do could _ever_ make up for what’s already been done.” Charles refrains from commenting on the underlying meaning of ‘No one is beyond redemption,’ feeling that there have been enough hysterics for one night. The last thing he needs is to agitate whatever deep-rooted trauma exists in Erik’s past to make those words laden with so much meaning. “Besides, you’ve already made it clear that I’m no use to you.”

“If not for yourself, then do it for Raven, and all of the Juggernaut’s victims and the ones who will continue to die if we don’t catch him as soon as possible.” Erik leans forward, true conviction beginning to bleed through his voice. “You were of no use as a psychic, but you _aren’t_ a psychic. Don’t you see, Xavier? If what you say about your observational skills is true, then you might find something we’ve missed. You can actually put your abilities to use for something _real_. No more hiding.”

Charles forces himself to take deep breaths. Fooling ignorant heiresses with a posh accent and a smile is one thing—what he’s being propositioned for now is something different altogether and the singular intensity of the other man’s gaze makes his insides feel as if they are steel beams collapsing under the force of gravity.

“This is…a lot to consider, Agent Lehnsherr. This isn’t something I can just jump into.”

“But you concede that it’s better than doing nothing.”

They are cut off by a sharp, but polite rapping on the hotel door. Charles glances at the clock—good lord, it’s almost five in the morning. Thankful not to have to scrounge about for a reply that would be inadequate by any measure, he all but leaps up from his seat and strides to the door on shaky legs, his backside slightly sore from having sat on the couch in the same position for so long.

“Agent Summers,” He says with as much confidence as he can muster as he opens the door, and Agent Summers looks a little less like he would rather be chewing on aluminum foil or leaping into a tank full of piranhas. Lehnsherr told everyone to go home, but he highly doubts anyone has been able to get much rest.

“How are you holding up, Mr. Xavier?” He asks haltingly, and Charles swallows the hiccup of laughter because despite the awkwardness of the question, Agent Summers genuinely does care about his well-being. He’s still relatively new to the squad, Charles can tell from his stance and how he shifts from foot to foot, the fist of one hand pressed into the palm of the other, but he’s seen enough dead bodies by now to stop shying away. It’s interacting with the family members of the victims that is still awkward for him.

“As well as could be expected,” Charles says, because not everyone is as difficult to lie to as Erik Lehnsherr, and it’s a vague enough statement to be comforting that Agent Summers would be willing to take it at surface value. “I expect you’ve returned for Agent Lehnsherr?”

“It’s just that the Chief is asking for him early this morning, but I can come back if you’re not finished talking—”

“Oh no, not at all. I’ve quite taken up enough of your time, haven’t I? You’ve more important things to do than babysit me.” Charles starts as Lehnsherr brushes past him, his face back to its original, cool demeanor. He hadn’t heard him rise from the couch at all. “Thank you, Agent Lehnsherr. I appreciate all that you’ve done for me tonight, truly.”

Lehnsherr raises an eyebrow and inclines his head. “Get some rest. We’ll have police detail outside your door all day in case you need anything, but you’re free to go any time once it’s light enough. Think about what I said, Xavier. You can’t run forever.” Satisfied with Charles’ terse nod, he turns to Agent Summers. “Call the Chief. Tell him we’re on our way.”

Charles stays in the doorjamb, watching them walk down the hallway and into an elevator, where a gangly redheaded officer even younger than Summers exits. He introduces himself as Sean Cassidy with a tired, but bright smile and plops down on the floor of the hallway, leaning his back against the floral wallpaper and sipping his cup of coffee jovially.

“Just holler if you need me,” He says, whipping out his phone with his free hand, and Charles, too exhausted to do anything but nod gratefully, shuts the door and shuffles back to the couch to watch the sun rise over the Atlantic Ocean.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HELLO (if you are even still keeping up with this)! After an atrociously long time, I have finally gotten around to finishing this most recent chapter. Unfortunately, not a lot happens, but now that we've got Charles' backstory all figured out, chapters should be coming on a weekly basis for the next few weeks. Of course, I say that now, but who knows where we'll be tomorrow? At any rate, thanks for checking it out, and I always welcome comments. I hope everyone is having a really wonderful holiday season!


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just when you think this fic will never be finished, the award for "updating at a snail's pace with a chapter in which not a lot happens anyway" goes to this one!

**( 12:13PM, Wednesday )**

 

"You're troubled."  
  
Moira looks up to see Charles gazing at her over the lip of his teacup, soft but scrutinizing. "How could you tell?" She asks, and he chuckles, setting his cup of Earl Grey down and folding his hands together behind them, leaning forward, and she finds that she can't turn away from his eyes, trained attentively, almost hypnotically, on her.  
  
Never much one for daytime talk shows, Moira only knew of Charles through word-of-mouth and the occasional featured guest spot on the news before the incident with the Juggernaut. Now though, she is beginning to understand why Charles was and remains so good at what he  
does--it's impossible to look away from him.  
  
"Your jaw is set and you tend to play with the ends of your hair when you're nervous to keep from clenching your fists, which would be a far more obvious tell. It's a very beautiful color, by the way, controlled by the MCR1 gene--did you know that auburn hair is a mutation? I've  
always found it to be fascinating."  
  
Moira laughs, startled. "I didn't, but I suppose I should have known better than to ask how you knew."  
  
Charles offers her an understanding smile. "It's about Agent Lehnsherr, isn't it? You think he dislikes you."  
  
"Is it because I work for the Feds?" She asks, stirring her cup of coffee with a spoon to avoid touching her hair again, suddenly very aware of the movements of her own body.  
  
"No, that's not it. Agent Lehnsherr is...well, he has his own way of doing things; very meticulous, detail-oriented, and thorough. When he first came to the WCBI, he was working as close to freelance as one could be--he refused a partner."

“Why?”

Charles shrugs. “No one’s ever been able to get a solid answer. His file says that he’s been hired for his experience in tracking down missing persons, just as mine says I’ve been hired as a criminal profiler.”

“That’s not true?”

“It’s not untrue—only more so that Agent Lehnsherr takes interest in the criminal than the victim.”

“So he’s been hired to hunt down the Juggernaut.”

“Oh, Agent Lehnsherr isn’t particularly interested in the Juggernaut. He’s gotten us closer than we’ve ever been before, but he is no more than a side project at best.” Moira doesn’t miss the way Charles glances down at his fingers before smiling at her again, picking up the plastic spoon he had set aside earlier and dunking it in his tea. She doesn’t have to be a profiler to know when someone is using a carefully neutral expression to mask darker thoughts.

“That’s not to say, of course,” Charles continues mildly, tapping his spoon on the rim of the teacup, “That the Juggernaut isn’t important, or that I don’t have the utmost confidence in Agent Lehnsherr’s ability to catch him.”

“Would it be useless of me to ask what he’s really after?”

The sound Charles makes over the rim of his teacup is almost a laugh. “It’s all conjecture at this stage, Agent McTaggert. Even I know very little about who he’s searching for, but I can say that I certainly don’t envy him when he is found.”

Moira thinks of Lehnsherr’s face, his jaw set and cold, clear eyes flashing out from underneath his dark brow. She thinks of his hands, the veins that run up his wrists into his palms, and the way the muscles in his fingers flex, as if they long to wrap around the neck of some invisible aggressor.

She shivers involuntarily, waving it off when concern leaks into Charles’ expression. No, she wouldn’t envy that person either.

\--

**( 1:07AM, Thursday )**

 

Erik shoves his ring of keys between his teeth, biting down on the rubber body of his pocket flashlight to keep the light steady as he fits the key into the first file cabinet.

Fuck the WCBI for having such ridiculously stringent policies on access to personnel files, fuck them even more for not keeping a more accessible set of cohesive records (sometimes he swears they do things like this just to spite him—it was never this bad, even when he was based in a bumfuck-nowhere town in the middle of Kansas), and fuck them the most for giving the only set of keys to Hank McCoy of all people. His only saving grace as far as Erik is concerned is keeping his desk such a mass of swirling chaos that he was able to pocket the keys off his desk this morning under the guise of looking for Xavier, who liked to sleep there sometimes.

It’s been three years, and Erik still isn’t sure what to think of Charles Xavier, doesn’t know whether to classify him as an ally or an enemy. Everyone he’s ever met he’s been able to put into either one category or the other—Darwin, for example, is an ally and possibly the most competent person currently working for the WCBI. The rest of his team, Summers and Cassidy and even Hank when Erik is having a good day, he has also begrudgingly come to consider his allies. When push comes to shove he finds them dependable enough and they keep the station interesting.

The man who killed his mother, on the other hand, is an enemy, and Erik will take him down.

The first cabinet of files yields no result, though that’s not surprising. Erik pushes it shut and kneels to open the next one.

Charles—Charles Xavier puts him on edge for so many reasons he’s not sure he can name them all. There is no trace left of the man Erik sat with on the night of his sister’s murder, for one. Cassidy returned to the station a few hours after he left to say that Charles had checked out of the hotel and that he had been driven back to his house. When Erik asked whether he had mentioned anything to him about Erik, Cassidy just shrugged and wandered off to find the leftover box of donuts in the communal fridge.

Erik heard nothing of Charles for over a week and he was ready to give up on the idea altogether until one morning he sauntered back through the doors, looking sharp and unflappable in a light grey suit, hands tucked into his pockets and an easy grin on his face.

“Well, Agent Lehnsherr,” He said by way of greeting when Erik ventured out of his office, curious at the sudden hush that fell over the station a second time, “I’ve given thought to your generous offer.”

There was absolute silence as Erik waited for Charles to continue, but all he did was rock back on his heels and grin a little wider, obviously waiting for Erik to humor him, which he finally did with the most threatening growl he could muster. “…and what, Xavier?”

Charles spread his arms out wide, as if in supplication. “Put me to work.”

Erik thought it would take him some time to fit into the office, but he slid into its rhythm with an almost uncanny grace. By the end of the week, he had solved his first homicide case, one that had been passed from unit to unit for weeks until it had gone cold, in under an hour. By the following Monday, he knew the names of everyone in the office as well as how many children they had and when their birthdays were (both the employees and their children). By the Wednesday of that same week, he had memorized everyone’s individual coffee order and paid for it all on his own dime, thereby endearing himself to the force forever onto eternity. By Friday, he was being invited to drinks after work with Erik’s unit in celebration of closing their third case.

By the end of his first full month with the WCBI, it was almost as if no one could remember either what the office had been like before Charles Xavier had joined or the circumstances that had brought him there in the first place. In some ways, it made Erik’s life easier.

It also made Charles imperceptibly dangerous.

Such a complete one-eighty in terms of personality had to be the result of some…thing. Erik doesn’t know what to call it and he hates psychology, but he knows that his flippant goodwill and enduring insistence on insipid pleasantries can’t be anything more than a carefully-constructed façade. No one can possibly cope so quickly; no one goes through the magnitude of trauma Charles went through without losing some piece of themselves in the process.

Still nothing. Erik slams the second drawer shut a little harder than he intended, a frustrated growl rising in his throat. If the file he’s looking for isn’t in the last drawer, then the killer has somehow beaten him to the punch and these last ten years will all have been for nothing. He is looking for the name to match a number, a number he has written down so many times in the past that it feels like it’s been imprinted somewhere on his consciousness, that he’ll never be rid of it. It’s a number he has done unspeakable things to obtain, chasing down any lead he could find, calling in favors from all over the world, all coalescing into this one moment. With lead settling heavily in his stomach, he continues to search.

No matter how many times Erik has asked him over the years, Charles has always maintained that he has no interest in killing the Juggernaut, but there’s no way he has never entertained the notion of revenge. He catches Charles watching him sometimes though he always averts his eyes when noticed. Erik wonders what Charles sees when he looks at him. Can he somehow figure out, just by reading him, the things Erik has done to get this far, how many dark deeds he’s committed without blinking an eye, all in his determination to hunt down and kill the man who destroyed his family? Does he wonder if Erik considers him a coward for not wanting the same? Can he pull the evidence for his crimes out of Erik like he has for so many suspects before?

He’s never asked exactly what Charles knows about him. Charles Xavier is a time-bomb, one that Erik has no idea how to defuse—

His train of thought derails abruptly as he flips through the last few folders and— _yes_ —

The number is written in slightly-smeared blue ink, but it’s there, all six digits of it. Erik runs his fingers across the faded label with a sort of twisted reverence—this must be what Percival felt like, finding the Holy Grail. With fingers that haven’t shaken since the day his mother died, Erik opens the file and begins to read.

 

The cover page reads  _Shaw, Sebastian, Commissioner of the Westchester Bureau of Investigation - March 2002 to present._


End file.
